CARTO, the leader in Location Intelligence, today released their first open source software development kit for mobile following last year’s acquisition of mobile software company Nutiteq.

CARTO Mobile SDK 4.0 makes location analytics, real time visualization, and offline services accessible for native mobile application developers. The SDK creates applications focused on fast online and offline services as well as location analytics. “One of the biggest obstacles for mobile application development has been the required online connection for location services and map rendering,” said Jaak Laineste, Head of Mobile at CARTO. “The open source CARTO Mobile SDK addresses this and extends offline capabilities.”

The new release allows for uninterrupted mapping displays and services such as geocoding, routing, and searching even in offline environments. This is key for developing professional applications in industries such as agriculture, development, and humanitarian efforts in areas with limited cellular coverage. In addition to these offline features, the SDK allows for more support for spatial data types, 3D modeling, vector basemaps, and the ability to easily render millions of features.

Lonely Planet, a leading travel media company and the world’s most successful guidebook brand leveraged CARTO’s native SDK to develop mapping for their popular, free and offline-ready application Guides by Lonely Planet for Android. “CARTO’s mobile SDK helps us get our travelers to the heart of their destination through an easy to use interface for offline mapping capabilities. The technology enables users to access Lonely Planet's top tips and experiences in map format on the ground and offline,” said Diego Jimenez, Head of Mobile Product and Design at Lonely Planet. “We're immensely proud of the success of Guides, which features Lonely Planet's expert content for over 100 cities and has already reached over a million downloads worldwide.”

The SDK can be used as standalone as well as integrated with CARTO’s open Location Intelligence platform. Data can be fully managed in the cloud, analyzed, and visualized using any of the platform’s tools. This allows for fast visual prototyping and deployment of application updates instantly from any web-based environment.